9 sacred sites of Stone Age Scotland
9 sacred sites of Stone Age Scotland
It was the way of the ancients to celebrate the sun, the moon and the dead.
Scotland has a rich selection Neolithic sites which give some insight into human existence in what is now Scotland between 4000BC and 2300BC.
Here we look at some of the earliest existing evidence of human life - and the ritual sites that were most sacred to our stone age ancestors.
It was the way of the ancients to celebrate the sun, the moon and the dead.
Scotland has a rich selection Neolithic sites which give some insight into human existence in what is now Scotland between 4000BC and 2300BC.
Here we look at some of the earliest existing evidence of human life - and the ritual sites that were most sacred to our stone age ancestors.
Ring of Brodgar, Orkney
The Ring of Brodgar Stone Circle and Henge is an enormous ceremonial site dating back to the 3rd millennium BC.
Originally consisting of 60 stones, 36 survive today alongwith 13 prehistoric burial mounds. The site sits around six miles form the Neolithic settlement of Skara Brae.
The Scottish geologist Hugh Miller, visiting in 1846, wrote that the stones ‘look like an assemblage of ancient druids, mysteriously stern and invincibly silent and shaggy’.
Lying between two freshwater lochs, the circle - with a diameter of around 104metres - may have been used for rituals, or for astronomical observation of the equinoxes and winter solstices, which guided farmers to prepare for spring planting.
Tomb of the Eagles, Isbister, Orkney
This Neolithic chambered tomb is situated on a clifftop at Isbister, South Ronaldsay, in the Orkneys.
The grave dates to 3000 BC and contains the remains of perhaps 300 people buried over a period of 800 years.
Beside the human remains, the talons and bones of around 14 white-tailed sea eagles were found.
The bird remains date to c 2450-2000 BC.
The Tomb of the Eagles was discovered by accident in 1958 by local farmer, Ronnie Simison. The site has now been excavated and Neolithic artefacts and stone tools dated.
Wormy Hillock, Finglenny, Aberdeenshire
This small hillock is traditionally associated with the burial of a monster or snake.
Legend states that the monster - possibly a dragon - had been attacking villages in the neighbourhood, and the villagers eventually succeeded in killing the beast.They then half-buried its corpse and mounded dirt over it, making a mound.
THe henge, which is on a steep bank in Clashindarroch Woods, is around 16.5metres wide.
Balfarg Henge, Fife
A housing estate on the outskirts of Glenrothes is the unexpected home to Balfarg Henge, a ritual site dating back possibly to 2,300BC.
Archaeologists excavated the site in the 1970s ahead of the housing development with a decision then taken to use the henge as the estate's centrepiece.
The site is likely to have been used for cremeations, with pits filled with broken pottery, burnt wood and bone.
A henge was later built with a 16-metre circular ditch constructed around the site.
Sixteen giant timber posts, possibly around four-metres tall, dotted the circumfrence of the henge. They were later replaced by standing stones, of which only two survive.
Around 2000BC, a young man aged around 20 was buried in a grave in the centre of Balfarg which was capped by a two-tonne piece of rock. He was buried with a beaker and a flint knife.
Cairnpapple Hill, near Bathgate, West Lothian
A rare ceremonial complex in the Bathgate Hills, rituals were held and neolithic monuments were first at Carinpapple some 5,500 years ago.
Visitors can enter the reconstructed cairn that lies at the heart of the complex.
Around 3000BC, a henge was built at Carinpapple with a one-metre ditch surrounding the site. An earthbank was formed from the displaced earth to obscure the interior of the site from view.
Within the ditch was a ring of 24 large wooden posts, although these have long disappeared.
By about 2000BC the henge had fallen out of use.
Around 2,000 BC, an important burial was held near the centre of the ring with two bodies also laid to rest nearby.
The henge fell out of use shortly afterwards.
The Twelve Apostles, by Hollywood, Dumfries and Galloway
Mainland Scotland's largest stone circle - and the seventh largest in Britain - measures a staggering 86 metres in diameter.
It is described as a "large but much disturbed" circle and sits around two miles from the Dumfries by-pass, near the village of Hollywood.
Eighteen stones may have originally stood on the Neolithic site, which was possibly oval in shape back in the beginning, around 2,300 BC.
Only five of the stones still stand, with some of those lying down thought to be part of the original formation.
Four of the stones at the site are local, the rest having apparently been moved by manpower from Irongrey Hill some two miles away.
A bronze figure thought to represent St Norbert and date back to the 1100s was dug up during an excavation in the 1880s. The figure is kept in Dumfries Museum.
Cairn Holy Chambered Cairns, near Wigtown Bay, Dumfries and Galloway
This pair of Neolithic chambered cairns stand on a sloping hill looking south over Wigtown Bay and were probably built in the 4th millennium BC.
One of the monument,Cairn Holy II is said to be the tomb of the mythical Scottish king Galdus, who is said to have fought off the Romans in the first century AD.
Both tombs are listed as Clyde Cairns, a common type of tomb in the south west of Scotland.
Both tombs are now open to the sky after their covering stones were taken to build field dykes.
Cairn Holy I is the more elaborate of the two. Evidence has been found of several fires being lit in the forecourt, with a cereomonal axe, shards of pottery and a lead-shaped arrowhead found at the site.
Callanish Stones, Isle of Lewis
One of the most spectacular neolithic sites in Britain, it is believed Callanish on Lewis was first used around 3,000BC.
Older than Stonehenge, is generally believed that Callanish functioned as an astronomical calendar associated with the moon and that it accurately marked the 18.61 year cycle of maximum lunar declination.
Patrick Ashmore, who excavated at Calanais in the early 1980s, recorded: "The most attractive explanation… is that every 18.6 years, the moon skims especially low over the southern hills. It seems to dance along them, like a great god visiting the earth.
"Knowledge and prediction of this heavenly event gave earthly authority to those who watched the skies."
Callanish was a sacred site right into the Bronze Age but was abandoned sometime around 1,500BC.
Standing Stones of Stenness, Orkney
Back to Orkney and The Stones of Stenness, which may be the earliest henge monument in the British Isles, built about 5,400 years ago.
Historic Environment Scotland said it was likely the stones were used for ceremonies to celebrate the relationship between living and past communities.
The monument was dated to around 3100 – 2900 BC by radiocarbon analysis of bones found in the ditch surrounding the monument.
Records from HES show the the ditch would have been at least 4metres wide and 2metres deep, and was cut into bedrock.
The stones were arranged in an oval shape, about 30m in diameter, set within this enclosure.
In 1814, a the local farmer, Captain MacKay, destroyed the nearby Stone of Odin in frustration at visitors crossing his land to visit the site. A second stone was also toppled.
It is said the Stone of Odin had a circular hole, through which local lovers plighted their troth by holding hands.
The Stones of Stenness passed into the care of the State in 1906.